Audio files taking lots of memory ? help

We have since 10 years constantly projects with up to 80 hours in timeline and 50 to 100 GB audiofiles in thousends of clips, because we digitaze and restore tons of tapes and vinyl.
We never had a problem with the memory.
Only the drawing of the waveforms make sometimes problems in large projects.
Cakewalk is the best audioeditor for large projects with many audiofiles.
Converting files will not reduce the memory.
 

Resourcewise, playing back audio is the easiest job there is in SONAR.
As for the VST FX and soft synths: Freeze, bounce, Apply FX, archive (if it still exists?) are all methods to
lower the load on memory. Also, you can bypass FX during tracking, and enable them during mixing and
simultaneously increasing buffer size. Some may use FX with low CPU or memory load during tracking, and replace them with the more demanding ones when mixing.
 
Just read the manual. It's all explained there.

I sometimes freeze midi tracks that I am done working with (especially drums), which seems to help my performance.
 
I suggest that you research optimizing your DAW for music production. As a matter of fact, google on that exact phrase  "optimizing...production" and you will get a lot of info on how to make the best use of your box using Sonar. Some tweaks are easy and carry no danger: Such as moving processes from the foreground to the background, or what power scheme you are using (many computers are pre-set to use a minimum of power, which you don't want using Sonar). Also, projects can be kept on a second internal hard drive that differs from where the Sonar app is installed. On the other hand, some tweaks involve registry changes or allocating virtual memory, which makes some folks nervous. Do whatever is in your comfort zone. Some simple changes can make a big difference.
 
Also, I suggest you put your computer OS/processor/memory/speed/graphics card and other music-related info, such as audio interface etc. in your forum signature if you plan on asking any more technical questions on the forum...It helps us a lot to be able to see that when answering questions!

Ok I just found signature section thanks rbecker